Long Term Proposals for Development July 2013
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Long Term Proposals for Development July 2013 Long Term Proposals for the Development of Manston – Kent’s International Airport Submission to the Airports Commission 19 July, 2013 1. Introduction This document sets out in outline form, proposals for the long-term development of Manston - Kent’s International Airport. It has been drawn up as a response to the Airport’s Commission’s invitation in its Guidance Document 01: Submitting evidence and proposals to the Airports Commission (Feb 2013), which specifies that submissions should: Outline proposals and give an overview of the level of additional capacity that would be provided, along with some of the key economic, social and environmental considerations associated with it. Adopt an integrated approach to the proposals, taking into account a broad range of factors, including possible problems raised by the proposals and means of resolving or mitigating them. Facilitate the early identification of barriers to delivery of the proposed scheme by indicating whether they stem from legal (UK or EU), technical or other sources. State how the proposals would operate (e.g. the types of aircraft and the mix of short, medium and long-haul traffic they would be able to accommodate), and how they would expect the airline sector, including full-service, low cost and freight carriers and other airports in the UK and internationally, to respond when the additional capacity becomes available. Assess the impacts of the scheme being promoted under six broad categories of factors: economic; social; climate change; local environmental; accessibility and feasibility. Commission Guidance Document No.2: Long Term Options - Sift Criteria, then added ‘strategic fit’ to the above list following consultation on the original list of factors and also split feasibility into ‘cost’ and ‘deliverability’. Long Term Proposals to Airports Commission 1 19 July 2013 We have endeavoured to follow this specification in preparing this submission, but given that the Airport is currently going through a sale process and as agreed with the Commission Secretariat, this submission is of necessity indicative and the associated appraisal of impacts at a very high level. Should the Commission wish to look in more detail at the contribution Manston could make to available capacity in a future South East airports system, we would willingly develop this submission further, through the egis of either the current or prospective future owners. 2. Relationship Between Manston’s Potential Interim Role and our Long Term Proposals Based on our meeting with the Commission Secretariat on 22nd May, we are conscious of the read across there is likely to be between interim – particularly medium term (5-15 year) initiatives and long term proposals. With this in mind, it is worth cross-referencing our Interim Measures submission at this juncture, as it explicitly highlights the potential for Manston to develop a number of specialist roles within the South East airport system, as a forerunner to its long term development as a substantive reliever airport, which is a concept we focus on later in this submission. The Interim Measures submission envisaged: (a) Expanding Manston’s currently modest passenger traffic by: ‘Finding the right fiscal signals or regulatory mechanisms to persuade airlines and air cargo carriers to loosen their attachment to the principal London airports and enable Manston to be ‘switched-on’ as a ‘release valve’ for the regions most congested airports’, in a way that will allow a significant proportion of traffic that is currently travelling across/through London or around the M25 from Manston’s natural catchment area to access Heathrow and Gatwick to be serviced more locally.’ It goes on to note that: ‘Displacement of traffic of the kind suggested above, is likely to take the form of smaller regional aircraft no longer being able to access or afford slots at the Heathrow and/or Gatwick, resulting in domestic regional services, thin international routes and lower value leisure routes being withdrawn or moved to another airport (one of which would be Manston) and back-filled by larger aircraft flying long haul or high density short haul routes.’ (b) Expanding Manston’s role as a dedicated air cargo facility capable of accepting all-cargo flights of any size displaced voluntary or because of new Traffic Distribution Rules from Heathrow and Gatwick (and ultimately possibly Stansted), Long Term Proposals to Airports Commission 2 19 July 2013 in a location from which the whole of London and most of the South can be reached within acceptable trucking times; (c) Formally designating Manston as a principal diversion airport for Gatwick and Heathrow, and equipping it accordingly, so that it can help to deliver a measure of system-wide resilience that would allow these airports to operate at higher levels of slot utilisation than might otherwise be possible while new capacity is being created; (d) Displacing long term MRO (i.e. C and D checks), flight testing and commercial pilot training to Manston (as is currently happening with BA acceptance trial of the A380/B787); or (e) Increasing its role as a Helicopter base as a result of the arrival of The Search and Rescue operation, the existing flying school and the potential for servicing offshore wind farm arrays located nearby. These Interim proposals were all about changing the industry’s perception of Manston as being too remote from London and serving only a small discrete catchment in East Kent, to one where it is seen as multi-faceted; it being a reliever airport for the capital, combining an expanding passenger role particularly for low cost and charter flights, with other activities demanding: an established, licensed and competitively priced airport with a long runway and substantial spare apron; few operating restrictions (crucially Manston lies outside outside the London TMA although there is some interaction with it, and is open to traffic that would be considered noise sensitive in London); relatively close proximity to London (Manston is only 60 miles, or 60 minutes travel time, east of the Capital) and near Europe. We recognise that to achieve these ambitions we need some a combination of fiscal interventions of the type suggested in our Interim Measures submission to work in tandem with increasing congestion at other airports to change market perceptions. But with this in mind, we are already taking steps to secure a London designation with IATA and have received support from Gatwick and Heathrow for doing so. 3. Market Analysis to 2030 From the demand profiling work we undertook for our Interim Measures submission, we are confident that there are a number of niche’s in the South East passenger market that Manston could help to address, not only in the medium term, but depending on future capacity development scenarios elsewhere, also in the period between 2025-50, which we are taking to correspond with the longer term. Long Term Proposals to Airports Commission 3 19 July 2013 Catchment Area Using the most recent CAA survey data we have access to (from 2011 and 2012), we have been able to build up a picture of the nature and geographical distribution of existing demand within Manston’s current core and extended catchment areas. These are illustrated in Figure 1, whose authenticity is verified by empirical evidence gathered during EU Jets operation from Manston in 2005, illustrated in Figure 2. Figure 1: Manston Airports Catchment Area Figure 2: Distribution of EU Jet Passengers Using Manston in 2005 Long Term Proposals to Airports Commission 4 19 July 2013 As can be seen, while the Airport’s core catchment is focused in Kent within an area bounded by the M25 and M20, its wider (or contested catchment) expands beyond both into East Sussex and the outer London suburbs East and South East of the capital. Based on this analysis, we sought to identify how many air travellers who use other airports in the London area, have their origins or destinations within Manston’s catchment area. We looked at this first based on existing surface access infrastructure and associated travel times, and then extrapolated this based on assumptions about those links to be improved or extended. This then provided a useful platform for the second part of the analysis, which examined the picture painted by DfT’s 2011 and 2013 forecasts, in terms of the potential scale and nature of the capacity shortfall facing the South East moving forwards, and the contribution Manston can potentially make to meeting some of that shortfall by targeting certain key markets. This in turn, then acts as a forerunner to a brief description of how Manston could be developed to meet this demand before setting out a series of generic and airport specific policy propositions that we consider necessary to facilitate Manston taking on this role. It is worth pointing out at this juncture, that this approach has been driven by the absence of any DfT Forecasting model runs that have included Manston. We know that there are spare slots within the model to add airports, and we hope that the Commission will at the very least request DfT produce model outputs for Manston under a Constrained (or Max Use) scenario and one with one additional runway added either at Heathrow or Stansted by 2030 but with the surface access enhancements we outline later incorporated. Demand Assessment Figure 3 below, provides an overview of current demand density in the southernmost part of the UK. As can be seen, the level of demand for air travel emanating from Kent is comparable with other parts of the Home Counties around London, save for those immediately adjacent to Heathrow and Gatwick. Figure 3: Density of Demand in the Southern Half of England and Wales Source: CAA Data Long Term Proposals to Airports Commission 5 19 July 2013 Our analysis of O&D survey data collected from the other London airports, indicates that Manston’s core and floating catchment areas currently generate demand of between 3.5-4.0m passengers per annum, depending on where the exact boundaries of the Airport’s catchment is drawn (see Table 1).